


The Greatest Love of All

by sign_of_one



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Beach City Talent Show, Digital Piano, Gen, Karaoke, whitney houston - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2021-01-25 07:30:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21352525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sign_of_one/pseuds/sign_of_one
Summary: Pink Diamond thinks she can just make everything better by singing some stupid song.
Relationships: Pink Diamond & Spinel (Steven Universe)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12





	The Greatest Love of All

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Toni Erdmann](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/532558) by Maren Ade. 

“Pink, are we done?”

Spinel wrapped her gloved hand around Pink Diamond’s wrist. She was halfway to stepping out from behind the stage curtain, but Spinel dug her pointed boots into the wooden baseboards and reeled her arm back in. The pom-poms on Pink’s slippers bounced as she turned around.

“These people want to get back to their show, they came to see all their human friends perform…”

She was literally tying her hands in knots. “I know they don’t want to see  _ me _ \- not after what I did to their Earth. Can’t we just call it a night?”

Pink crouched down to Spinel’s eye level. She was smiling with her eyes half-closed. 

“But you’ve changed. Why wouldn’t they want to see you now?”

She reached out to reassuringly touch Spinel’s wild right tail of hair, but she sidestepped. She pointed her gaze down and gestured to her eyes, her color scheme, and her upside-down heart. Her backstage voice was urgent and sharp:

“Pink,  _ I don’t like being seen like this!  _ I don’t like how I look!”

It must have been just a little too loud. Mr. Smiley, also watching from backstage as mixed gem-human improv troupe One Dozen Eggs (What Are Eggs) took their bows and disassembled their nondescript black boxes, glanced at the two of them with some concern but without dropping his big, big smile. Pink Diamond waved happily back at him while Spinel tugged her wrist and continued, building speed:

“You know this is  _ crazy,  _ right? I’m...I’m happy I get to see you again, but  _ we aren’t ready to do a show together!  _ I’m not ready! _ ” _

Pink grinned at her. Spinel remembered how much Diamonds could say without opening their mouths. She slid Spinel’s loopy arm off of her own like a rubber bangle, stood up to her full height, and approached Mr. Smiley.

“It’s been so much fun.”

Even in shorts and a dazzling sequined jacket, Mr. Smiley felt underdressed next to a gem. He was gracious: “Well - it’s been an honor! We’ve had surprise guests at the talent show before, but-”

“Maybe my best friend and I can play a song for you? Just to thank you for your hospitality?”

Spinel’s pink pupils desynchronized.

Mr. Smiley looked from the setlist on his clipboard, to the masked wrestlers waiting backstage for their call, to the towering pink space tyrant standing in front of him.

“...yeah! Why not? A little change of schedule will keep ‘em on their toes! I’ll just, uh, get the crowd warmed up!”

He chucked the setlist over his shoulder and hustled onstage, to mixed cheers from the audience.

Before she followed him, Pink laid a hand on Spinel’s stiff shoulder and smiled beatifically.

“Spinel. You deserve to shine.”

Then she turned and left, striding onstage and waving at the crowd like royalty.

Spinel tugged her pigtails and bonked her head until she stopped wanting to scream so much.

Then, she took her fingers and drew her lips into a smile. It stayed like clay. She made her eyes big and friendly and minimized the imminent panic, then took a jaunty stride onstage. Scattered on towels and lawn chairs and a few standing groups, the audience on the beach murmured to themselves.

“Beach City, we have had comeback kids and scrappy success stories on this stage before, but we have  _ never -  _ I oughta say we have  _ rarely -  _ had a performer in the talent show who tried to destroy the entire planet Earth.”

One of the decorrupted Crystal Gems in the crowd, a Biggs Jasper with both arms around her human pals, gave Spinel a big thumbs-up with two meaty claws. She nervously waved back.

“Coming to us all all  _ all  _ the way from…” Mr. Smiley squinted at his notecards. “...Pink Diamond’s Garden...City, put your hands together for... _ Spinel! _ ”

He pressed a microphone into her gloves and disappeared before she could ask questions, A spotlight wrapped her in a hot halo of attention. Showmanship was too finely carved into her gemstone for her to back down from the stage, but this was  _ nuts  _ \- what was she supposed to  _ do?  _ Juggle? Headstands? The audience was waiting...she tried a little soft-shoe routine, plus one jazz hand.

From behind her, amplified over cheap speakers, she heard the notes of a primitive digital piano.

Turning her rubber body 180 degrees at the waist, Spinel saw Pink Diamond, upstage left, at a 76-note Tamaha digital keyboard. Even with the flimsy plastic stand at maximum extension, it barely came up past the tops of her white stockings. She was playing the same five chords in sequence, waiting for her old playmate to pick up the beat.

She recognized it.

Spinel’s facial photons were agitated; that is, her cheeks were hot. One facet of her was touched by the choice of song. She covered the mic with her glove and hissed: “You’ve gotta be kidding me. You’ve  **gotta ** be kidding me.”

Pink played on. She was giving her that Diamond look.  _ I know you. I believe that you can do this. Make me proud. _

Spinel was already starting to tap the pointed toe of her boot, which was of course still facing the audience, along with her legs. The opening hook of the song was repeating, waiting for her to join in.

She turned her upper body back around and straightened up. The audience was patiently watching and smiling. A few of them nodded their heads. The Jasper folded her hands in her lap. She was dead sure that they all had to be staring at her form, her colors, but no one had screamed yet.

She raised the mic to her lips and sang: 

“ _ I believe that children are our future _

_ Teach them well and let them go their way _

_ Show them all the beauty they possess inside” _

She was bouncing uneasily to the beat on her stretchy legs.

_ “Give them a sense of pride _

_ To make it easier _

_ Let the children’s laughter _

_ Remind us how we used to be” _

Spinel fought to swallow the lump in her throat. Her dark and frayed voice was struggling with these lyrics, but the synthetic keyboard played on, muffled by the placement of the speakers. Leering over her shoulder with narrowed eyes, she missed the first half-beat of the next stanza.

_ “ -everybody searching for a hero _

_ People need someone to look up to _

_ I never found anyone who fulfilled my needs.” _

Her tails were curling. She felt heat on the back of her head on the two imaginary points where Pink’s innocent-loving-stupid Diamond eyes were burning holes.

_ “A lonely place to be _

_ And so I learned to depend on me” _

She turned her head and waved the audience away with a flourish of her glove. The fuchsia gem loop-de-looped her arm and leaned into the mic, singing and bouncing with more upside-down heart. The Tamaha played on:

_ “I decided long ago _

_ Never to walk in anyone’s shadow _

_ If I fail, if I succeed _

_ At least I’ll live as I believe” _

Her eyes were shut tight. She wasn’t thinking about the garden, oh no, that would be  _ exactly  _ what Pink wanted. She thought about holding the crowd’s eyes and rocking in time with the digital keyboard.

(don’t cry. Do not cry! Just get through the stupid number and - here it comes-)

_ “No matter what they take from me _

_ They can’t take away  _ ** _my dig-ni-ty!”_ **

Someone on the beach gave a whoop of solidarity. Hot tears squeezed through her eyelids. She clenched her glove tight and powered through:

_ “ _ ** _Because the _ ** _ greatest _

_ Love of all is happening to me” _

A few hands in the audience were starting to clap along, starting with that Jasper’s mitts. Spinel turned her head backwards to see Pink serenely smiling, focused on the same five chords on her keyboard. Her pupils bounced like pinballs from whiplash. She wanted to stretch out and rage that this feeling was  _ not  _ hers to give-

But she had to snap back front, blinking back dew, to catch the next verse:

_ “I found the  _

_ ~greatest~ _

_ Love of all _

_ Inside of me!” _

Her hands clasped hard over her upside-down heart, nearly cracking the mic before she chucked it over her shoulder. Mr. Smiley yelped and dived for his expensive sound equipment, but the audience was starting to cheer louder than the reverb. Spinel spiraled her hand into a megaphone and sunk to her knees, practically screaming over Pink’s placid keyboard plunking:

_ “The! Great-est! Love! _

_ of  _ ** _AAAAaaAALL!!!_ **

_ Is easy to achieve!” _

She was clenching her pumped-up fist tight. Her eyes blinked open, and she searched the crowd like she’d been backed into a corner. She threw her loopy arms wide and sang with her bare voice, straining to sell that she believed what she was singing.

_ “Learning to love yourself, _

_ Is the greatest love of all.” _

Her shoulders slumped, along with her hair. Seeing the encouraging, yet perplexed looks on the faces of the crowd made her want to retreat into her gem. She sniffed. 

As she rose to her feet, she heard Pink transitioning into the bridge. Was she really doing the  _ whole thing?  _ Spinel uncoiled her horn, stretched and snatched the mic back from the sequined MC, and hurried to catch the ship before it left.

“-andifbychancethat  _ special place _

_ That you’ve been dreaming of _

_ Takes you to a lonely place...” _

Spinel stiffened.

The backing music overtook her. Pink must have kept her fingers lingering on the last chord - Spinel didn’t look around to check. Her lips were stuck; the words weren’t coming out.

Pink kept playing. She must have sensed a snag, but rather than stop, she improvised a transition back to the beginning of the bridge. The show must go on. Spinel felt those Diamond eyes between her pigtails again. The townies exchanged glances, while the Jasper just watched in happy, eager suspense. They all  _ believed in her _ so much she could choke on it.

The tones of the digital keyboard lined up another shot at that last chord. Spinel looked past the crowd to an anonymous point in the night sky. She sang into the mic:

_ “...find your strength in _

_ lo-oo-oo-oove.” _

She was chewed-up bubblegum.

She stretched the mic back into Mr. Smiley’s hands and politely bowed to the audience. Pink Diamond played the final rising notes, but her playmate had already hopped off the stage onto the packed sand. The audience started to cheer. 

Spinel coiled up and sprung away. Pink would catch up to her sometime.


End file.
